Chapter Twenty-Three
The rooms at Lady Jersey’s were brilliant with light and movement, the great chandeliers above shedding such a profusion of brightness upon the polished floors and gilded moldings that every surface seemed to glow.
The evening had drawn an excellent assembly, as it always did when the hostess chose to gather the higher circles about her, and the consequence of the company lent the occasion an air at once elegant and faintly oppressive.
Footmen moved with practiced grace through the rooms bearing trays of ratafia and negus, while clusters of ladies in silks and satins formed and dissolved like shifting gardens under candlelight.
Music drifted in from the adjoining room, not loud enough to command the gathering, but sufficient to lessen its edges.
Elizabeth stood with the Matlocks, Jane, and Bramley in a portion of the drawing room that afforded both a view of the assembly and a degree of shelter from its constant circulation.
She had been grateful for the placement when they first arrived, though gratitude had quickly given way to restlessness.
Her gaze moved too often toward the doors, her thoughts too often strayed from the conversation immediately before her, and she knew herself distracted in a manner that would once have mortified her.
Now, however, she found she could no longer regret it.
There had been a time—not so very long before—when she had schooled herself to expect nothing from the future but usefulness, familial affection, and the manageable ache of old sorrow.
She had thought herself resigned. She had believed her lonely path laid plainly before her and had meant to walk it with what grace she could command.
That resignation seemed now like the memory of another woman’s life.
For he was here. He lived. He breathed the same air she did, moved through the same rooms, stood within reach and not within possession.
The knowledge had altered everything. It had not brought peace—far from it—but it had shattered the numb finality into which she had been settling these past years.
She could not return to what she had been before. She did not wish to.
Even now, with no certainty before her and no explanation offered, she found herself waiting for the briefest glimpse of him with a hunger that felt as necessary as breath itself.
Her gown that evening was of ivory satin, overlaid at the sleeves and bodice with delicate embroidery in pale blue silk.
Jane had insisted the color suited her exceedingly well, and Elizabeth had not resisted the matter, though she had smiled inwardly at the thought that she had once dressed merely to please her own taste, rather than with any awareness of who might see her.
The shell necklace lay at her throat as always, modest in size but impossible, to her own mind, to separate from memory.
When she had fastened it earlier before her glass, her hands had trembled only a little.
Jane, beside her, looked lovely in rose-colored silk, serenity and contentment seeming to lend a gentleness to every line of her face.
Marriage suited her. Happiness suited her still better.
Bramley hovered with that protectiveness which had become one of the most reliable features of his devotion, and Lady Matlock, seated near at hand, surveyed the room with the mild satisfaction of one well accustomed to such scenes and generally pleased by their management.
Lord Matlock was speaking of some recent matter in Parliament when Elizabeth’s attention, which had already begun to drift, was pleasantly interrupted by the approach of two figures she greeted with genuine warmth.
“Richard,” she said, smiling as Colonel Fitzwilliam and Anne joined their party. “How good it is to see you both. Anne, I am so pleased you are feeling better.”
For Anne had indeed looked below herself of late, pale and somewhat languid whenever Elizabeth had seen her, though she had borne it all with sweetness and her usual restraint.
This evening, however, there was a tenderness in her countenance that was not illness.
If anything, she seemed transformed—not dramatically, but subtly; some inward gladness had kindled a new warmth in her.
Anne returned Elizabeth’s greeting with a smile that was small but unmistakably radiant.
Marriage had altered her too, though in Anne the change was of a more delicate order.
Her reserve remained, but it no longer seemed born of frailty or habit alone.
There was confidence now where once there had been only dutiful stillness, and a security in Richard’s nearness that did not escape Elizabeth’s notice.
“Thank you,” Anne said, her voice low but clear. “I am very well indeed.”
Richard, who looked insufferably pleased with life, took his place beside his wife and said, “I told her she was blooming, but she accused me of partiality.”
“You are partial,” Anne replied, though her eyes shone with unmistakable affection.
“As any sensible husband would be,” Bramley said, laughing.
Lady Matlock turned her approving gaze upon Anne. “You do look stronger, my dear.”
Anne hesitated only the briefest moment before looking to Elizabeth with an expression that invited confidence. Then, with a glow that deepened becomingly in her cheeks, she said in a subdued tone, “I am with child.”
Elizabeth clasped her hands together in delight. “Anne!” She leaned forward at once and pressed Anne’s hand. “I am so very happy for you.”
Jane echoed the sentiment warmly, and even Lord Matlock’s severe features were touched with evident pleasure. Richard looked like he might have announced the news to every person in the room if propriety had allowed it, and perhaps even if it had not.
“You see?” he said to his wife. “Everyone must agree with me now.”
Anne gave him a look both fond and faintly reproving. “You are too pleased with yourself by half.”
“And with reason,” he returned.
Elizabeth could not help but smile. There was something deeply gratifying in seeing Anne thus—no longer cowed beneath Lady Catherine’s relentless will, no longer diminished by the life that had once seemed determined for her.
Rosings had not broken her, but neither had it allowed her to flourish.
Here, beside Richard, she was becoming fully herself.
“And Lady Catherine?” Jane asked with tactful curiosity.
Anne’s smile grew a touch more private. “My mother remains at Rosings Park. She has the dower house and, I think, every intention of ruling it as though it were still the principal residence.”
Richard coughed lightly to conceal what was very nearly a laugh.
Elizabeth raised her brows. “And has she been told?”
Anne glanced once toward her husband, then back again. “Not yet.”
Lady Matlock made a small sound that might have been amusement. “Then she is in for a surprise.”
“A considerable one,” Richard said.
Anne’s composure nearly failed her then, and she lowered her eyes in a way that told Elizabeth her friend was both nervous and pleased at the prospect.
It was impossible not to admire her for it.
That she, who had been governed so long, should now choose her own time and manner to speak such news to her formidable mother seemed in its own way a little triumph.
The conversation progressed for another few minutes, touching lightly on Rosings, on travel, on whether Anne ought to return to Kent before the weather shifted.
Elizabeth answered when spoken to and smiled where required, but once again her mind began to divide itself between the immediate subject and that other, unspoken expectation which haunted every gathering now.
He would be here. He must be. Before she could fret overlong, Bramley straightened and said, “Count Vendicarsi.”
The sound of the name passed through Elizabeth like a current. She turned before she could prevent herself. He stood only a few paces distant.
Darcy—though no one here knew him so—was dressed in dark evening clothes that suited the severe elegance of his assumed station.
The candlelight caught faintly along the edge of his waistcoat and the well-cut line of his coat, but it was his face that drew her entirely.
The beard still altered him; the closely cropped hair rendered him sterner than memory first expected.
None of that mattered. Her heart knew him with a certainty that no disguise could displace.
He bowed to the party with that same calm, restrained composure he showed the world.
And then, from beside her, there came the faintest strangled sound. Elizabeth’s head turned at once. Richard.
He had gone very still. So still, indeed, that the effect was more arresting than any exclamation might have been.
His eyes, typically open and animated, were fixated on the count with an expression Elizabeth had not previously observed—one comprising incredulity, emerging awareness, and an intensity bordering on rage.
Her own pulse leapt. She looked quickly back at Darcy. His expression had not altered. If he felt the force of Richard’s regard, he gave no sign. He remained grave, courteous, entirely master of himself.
But Elizabeth saw it then with perfect clarity. Richard had recognized him. The realization came not as shock, but as confirmation—one more link in the chain of certainty she had been gathering day by day. She scarcely breathed.
Before any word could be spoken, Lady Jersey herself descended upon the scene, all smiles and gracious insistence, claiming the count’s attention for another group of guests newly arrived and apparently too important to be delayed even a moment.
“Count Vendicarsi, you must allow me—” she began, and with no choice but civility, he turned away.
Elizabeth scarcely saw him go. Instead, she turned again to Richard. He met her gaze full on now.